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Staff Software Engineer - Managed Kubernetes

LambdaSan Francisco Office (Fremont St)Data Center Business
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Salary
$314K - $465K USD
Job type
Full-time
Work mode
Remote
Posted
24 Sept 2026
Status
Open · checked 7d ago

About this role

Lambda is seeking a Staff Software Engineer to lead the creation of its cutting-edge Managed Kubernetes platform designed specifically for artificial intelligence workloads. This foundational technical role suits an experienced infrastructure leader ready to drive distributed systems development at scale. Candidates are expected to work from the San Francisco office location four days per week.

Role Overview

As a Staff Engineer on the Orchestration team, the individual will steer the technical vision for managed orchestration services running on bare metal. The work sits at the crossroads of distributed systems, cloud-native infrastructure, and GPU-accelerated computing. Responsibilities include defining the roadmap for Managed Kubernetes, managed Slurm on Kubernetes, and platform services for inference and AIOps while collaborating closely with various infrastructure teams.

Key Responsibilities

Drive the technical roadmap and architecture for the Managed Kubernetes bare-metal platform, ensuring multi-tenancy, high availability, and control plane scalability.
Integrate and extend NVIDIA's open-source stack, incorporating tools such as the GPU Operator, Network Operator, DCGM, NCCL, and topology-aware scheduling projects.
Build foundational systems for Managed Slurm on Kubernetes and design inference platform services featuring model serving and automated scaling.
Lead chaos engineering initiatives and establish zero-downtime maintenance, security patching, and upgrade automation.
Act as a technical bridge across storage, security, and networking teams to translate requirements into actionable specifications.
Mentor fellow engineers and establish robust development best practices across the orchestration domain.

Requirements

Ten or more years of professional software engineering, platform engineering, or Site Reliability Engineering experience.
At least five years of focused, hands-on experience working with Kubernetes at scale.
Expert-level command of Kubernetes internals, extension patterns, API machinery, controllers, schedulers, and operators.
Holistic infrastructure background spanning compute, networking, storage, and security layers.
Production-level software development skills in Go and Python.
Extensive background in GPU orchestration within Kubernetes environments, including device plugins and time-slicing.
Proven history of technical leadership, cross-team design direction, and managing multi-tenant cloud platforms.
Strong grasp of distributed systems design principles, large-scale observability tools, and Linux networking.

Nice to Have

Direct experience building or operating managed Kubernetes control planes across major cloud providers.
Hands-on contributions to CNCF, Kubernetes SIGs, or NVIDIA open-source projects.
Background in Machine Learning infrastructure, high-performance computing, or confidential computing.
Familiarity with security compliance and workload isolation within multi-tenant environments.

Skills and Tools

Go
Python
Kubernetes
NVIDIA GPU Operator and Network Operator
Distributed Systems Architecture
Linux Systems and Networking
Infrastructure-as-Code and GitOps Workflows

Salary and Benefits

The annual salary range for this position is set between $314,000 and $465,000 USD. Employee benefits include generous cash and equity compensation, medical, dental, and vision health coverage for dependents, and a 401(k) plan featuring a 2% company match for United States employees. Additional perks feature wellness and commuter stipends alongside a flexible paid time off policy.

About the Company

Founded in 2012, Lambda operates with a fast-growing team exceeding 500 employees. The company provides superintelligence cloud infrastructure tailored for machine learning practitioners, researchers, and enterprises, backed by prominent investors and strategic partners including NVIDIA.

How to Apply

Interested candidates should visit the official company careers page to submit an application for this role.

Skills and tech stack

PythonKubernetes

Questions candidates ask

What is the salary range for the Managed Kubernetes Staff Engineer role?

The annual salary range is $314,000 to $465,000 USD.

Where is this job located?

The position is based out of the San Francisco office on Fremont Street, requiring presence in the office four days per week.

What programming languages are required?

Production-quality coding skills in Go (required) and Python are necessary for this position.

How many years of experience are required?

Applicants must have 10+ years of total software engineering, platform engineering, or SRE experience, with at least 5 years dedicated specifically to Kubernetes at scale.

What benefits does the company offer?

Benefits include cash and equity compensation, health, dental, and vision coverage, a 401(k) plan with a 2% company match, wellness and commuter stipends, and flexible paid time off.

Ready to apply?

The application is on the official Lambda careers page.

Apply on company site